Lindsay Graham: FBI’s ‘Hands Tied’ in Probing Islamic Extremists

The FBI is going to need more legal clout in order to effectively track Muslim extremist activity in the United States, South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham says.

On Monday, Graham called on Congress to “revisit’’ the laws that govern the FBI’s ability to track Islamic radicals, The Hill reports.

He noted the agency interviewed Boston Marathon bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev in 2011 at the request of the Russian government, which wanted to access his ties to Chechen terrorists — but Tsarnaev, who was killed in a police shootout on Friday, didn’t radicalize until later.

“In 2012 and 2013, when he became more radical, when he went on the Internet, when he interacted with this imam in Boston, the FBI tells me there is limitations on what they can do in situations like that,” said Graham in an interview with Fox News.

“What the FBI told me sounded very reasonable. But the FBI's hands are tied here when it comes to following radical Islamist websites, and we're at war, folks. And if we don't realize it, there's gonna be more of this.

“I don't want a police state,” Graham added. “But I want a nation where the police can protect us.”